Along with the current international retrospective on Florine Stettheimer in Germany, to which Columbia is the major lender, Art Properties has loaned a painting by Stettheimer to the exhibition “Classical Nudes and the Making of Queer History,” which runs from October 17, 2014, to January 4, 2015, at the Leslie-Lohman Museum of Gay and Lesbian Art in New York City. Stettheimer’s painting, Nude Study, Standing with Hands Clasped, dates from the late 1890s when she studied at the Art Students League in New York City. The exhibition explores the different ways classicism and classical subjects in art have come to be seen as closely tied to the history of queer culture. The show focuses on four areas: antiquity, Renaissance, 19th century, and modern/contemporary; artists in the exhibition include Aubrey Beardsley, Romaine Brooke, Paul Cadmus, Albrecht Dürer, Michelangelo, Herb Ritts, Del LaGrace Volcano, and others. Columbia University joins the New York Public Library, Library of Congress, Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, and other American institutions to help make this exhibition possible.
Roberto C. Ferrari, Curator of Art Properties, was a guest docent for the exhibition on November 8, 2014. For more information, contact the Leslie-Lohman Museum of Gay and Lesbian Art.
-by Roberto C. Ferrari, Curator of Art Properties